My Mom just had a birthday the other day. She turned 70 (sorry Mom!), and while I’m sure she’s cringing right now being a part of this article, 70 is an awesome milestone that should be celebrated, not looked at so negatively as we as a society do so often these days. In scripture, 7 is a number of perfection, so that means that 70 is the decade of perfection, right Mom and Dad? I think so. I look at how she loves her grandkids and while she’s not as spry as maybe she once was when she was fielding baseballs in the backyard growing up, she still gets out there with my son, and you know what? Mom has always been Mom, regardless of age or what year it is. She’s always been the same person to me.
Growing up, my siblings and I were raised Catholic. My Dad never converted, though he fully supported raising us Catholic and he himself is a very spiritual man. He taught me a ton about work ethic, character, and integrity. But it was my Mom who instilled the Catholic faith, teachings, and tradition in us. And since Monday was her birthday, I’m going to focus on Mom. Don’t worry Dad, I’ll write about you in August!
My Mom attended Catholic schools growing up and was always close with the clergy and the neighborhood parish growing up in Ft. Wayne, Indiana in the U.S. To this day, if you mention St. Louis De Montfort, she genuflects in honor of the Montfort Fathers (I’m sure she’s genuflecting as she reads this).
But Mom taught us what it means to be Catholic, and I’ll never forget the first time I mentioned as a teen that the Eucharist was a “symbol of Christ.” She quickly corrected me, informing me that it IS the Body and Blood of Christ! Of course we observed Lent, with no meat on Fridays, we celebrated the Sacraments – first communion, confirmation, and also confession every now and then as part of Catechism. There was always some sort of Catholic Diocesan newspaper or magazines around, and I always remember the discussions at the table about God, how science and God can coexist and are related, and discussions of our faith.
I knew my Mom prayed a lot. I knew she would ask for the intercession of various saints from time to time, and I always remember the pictures of Jesus and Mary, crucifixes and other artifacts around the house. One painting of Jesus in particular he was revealing His sacred heart, which happened to be the name of our small parish church growing up – Sacred Heart.
I wished I had listened more though. I wished I had embraced my faith more. I wished I would have paid more attention and tried more in Catechism classes. I wished I had taken being an Alter Server more seriously, and I wished I would have gotten more involved as a youth in our church. But looking back, my Mom taught me so much about my faith. Stuff that wouldn’t surface until many years later. In a way, this is what the readings our about today.
The readings today talk about the Law. Gods Law. In the first reading from Deuteronomy, Moses is telling the Israelites that they must keep the Law, specifically the Ten Commandments. If we simply abide by the Commandments, then life is easy, right? Well, it’s not that easy. We, as humans cannot live by the Law 100 percent of the time, every day. When sin entered the world, this fact was made known. But then Moses goes on to say, “However, take care and be earnestly on your guard not to forget the things which your own eyes have seen, nor let them slip from your memory as long as you live, but teach them to your children and to your children’s children.”
We need to learn from the graces we experience. We need to learn from our mistakes, and we need to learn from those before us. And then we have a duty to teach these same lessons to our children, and to their children, meaning we need to live by example and teach our kids right, so that they do the same, and so on.
In the Gospel today, Matthew writes about Jesus teaching about the Law. By this time, Jesus had been conducting His ministry, and people were excited thinking that He was going to change things on Earth and abolish the law. But in fact, he came to fulfill it. The Law has always been there, from the beginning. Things were in harmony and the world did not know sin, therefore it was simple to abide by the Law. But since the fall of Adam and Eve, humanity had been out of order with God. We were not in communion with Him anymore because our human nature, our tendencies, and our faults worked against us. As hard as we tried, we could not live by the Law. As hard as we tried, we could not be in communion with God. Jesus came to fix that, He came to fulfill the Law by providing us an out – a way we could come into communion with Him despite our sins and our faults.
In the Gospel, Jesus says, “Amen, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or the smallest part of a letter will pass from the law, until all things have taken place.”
The Law will never change. It will never subside until all things have taken place. These “things” started with the coming of Jesus, His crucifixion and resurrection, on through to today in us following His teachings and having faith in Him, and will end with Him coming again, whenever, or however, that may be. The point is, He laid a path. He laid a framework for how to follow Him, how we as sinners and people who do some not-so-good things can make it to Heaven and be in communion with God.
But there’s a catch – we have to pass it on. We can’t just try to live it, and be good Catholics and people of faith on our own for our own good. We have to live it, and we have to pass it on and teach it to others – to our kids, and their kids. To our friends, neighbors, and fellow parishioners and fellow citizens.
Jesus goes on to say, “Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do so will be called least in the Kingdom of heaven. But whoever obeys and teaches these commandments will be called greatest in the Kingdom of heaven.”
It means we reap what we sow. If we do bad things, live a self-serving life, and teach others through our example, we will receive that in return eventually. If we do good things, try to live a life as nobly and morally as we can, relying on our faith and the Sacraments when we fall, and teaching that to others, then we will receive good things for eternity. It’s as simple as that. Life will be rough. We will encounter trials that do not make sense. There will be temptations to make things seem easier. But it’s how we work through these times in live our lives, and more importantly what we teach to others that will make the real difference.
It’s what we teach to others – through what we say, and more importantly, how we act. It’s not until recent years that I really realized the faith foundation I had been given growing up. I did not embrace my faith until many years later. But the foundation that my Mom and Dad helped lay in my faith, character traits and morals stuck, and has lived with me, and guided my actions ever since. None of us are perfect and I continue to make my share of mistakes. But, those things that had been embedded in me from my earliest memories are now becoming clearer. Perhaps it’s the fact I now have a son that has really made me think about this, and made me want to be better and live a better example, and to teach him what I’ve been taught, how to be a good Catholic. This means I have to try to be one myself.
We have a duty. I need to pay it forward. We all do. We have a duty to our families, our parish communities, and the world to teach each other what it means to be a good Christian, a good person, and in our case a good Catholic. But it all starts at home, and in terms of my faith, it started with my Mom. Thanks Mom, and Happy 70th birthday!
